At the basis of my recent paintings lie my fears associated with being born devoid of a hand. In the paintings I transform personal descriptions of hands and prosthetics into my own visual vocabulary that includes an assortment of botanical representations in various states of definition. Plants act as visual placeholders for hands, prosthetics, and my birth defect. Typically during the process of painting, I set up problems for myself; these oppositions can pertain to subject matter, concept, or formal elements. Throughout the development of the work, collisions happen between many different types of problems. I find that in the process, vitality happens when I am able to locate, and solve both the organic, and the self-imposed visual equations at the same time. Often, the image retains the leftover residue, something lurking just underneath, and the important visual trajectories of the initial problem or equation. My solution often involves plants and flowers in various states of definition, that make me think of the differences between my right arm, which was damaged prenatally, and my left.